And The Morale of the Story is....
by Speaker for the Dead aka 17
Summary: I can't believe this! Fanfiction.net didn't put my story up on the New page but only on the Update page? Bah! It hates me! Anyway, Here's a Neelix story. It's supposed to be touching, but...
1. Default Chapter

onneelix1 ****

And The Morale Of The Story Is…

An excerpt from _Memoirs of the Delta Quadrant_ by Neelix

Edited by Lt. Taya 17 Janeway (TaTTooGaL™)

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Ladies and Gentlemen: As you know, we have something special for you down here at Birdland this evening- a recording from Blue Note Records…

One of the more remarkable anecdotes about our dear captain was actually my fault, mostly. Truth to tell, it was a rather embarrassing incident, one best conscripted to the dregs of one's memories, if not for the happy ending. But it turned out right in the end, you see, like most things on the _Voyager_ eventually did.

It was somewhere in the seventh and final year in our journey home, and we'd just finished some major battle or the other, and the standard repair routine was still underway. I was in the mess hall, trying to decide on which dish to prepare for the crew's dinner, when Captain Janeway came in, looking harassed. I came over with her usual cup of coffee. "Is there anything I can help you with, Captain?" I asked her.

She just smiled up at me in the tired manner that she had. "No, Neelix. I've just got this terrible headache." She shrugged, rubbing her temple absently. "It's nothing I can't bear, though." 

I brightened. Something I could help with! "A headache? Why, I believe I can help with that!" 

You see, in the past few days, I'd been researching into some Terran home remedies, and I'd come across this little herb which had been very popular for treating such headaches in Earth's twentieth century. They called it paracetamol. Of course, we grew none of that on the ship, but the replicator was happy to provide me with a small vial of powdery white substance. It was a little bitter, so I mixed it with sugar and dissolved it in water. It was a hit with many of the human crewmembers, and had a great degree of success in eradicating the headache. It was all for the best, you see.

Captain Janeway looked up at me, curious and hopeful. "Really?" 

"But of course! I found this wonderful substance from the annals of human homeopathy, and it works really well for headaches! I could mix some of it in your coffee, if you'd like." 

She smiled at me with gratitude in her eyes. "I'd like that very much, thank you." 

Humming merrily, I took her cup back to the pantry and mixed in several tablespoonfuls of the sugar-paracetamol blend into her coffee. I was mildly worried about the high sugar content it would give the coffee, but sometimes there's nothing that raises spirits like a slight excess of glucose.

I watched carefully as the captain took a few tentative sips of the coffee I handed back to her. "An… interesting taste," she noted, "but it's fine." 

So I left her to her own devices and went back to preparing for the crew's dinner. At length I decided that I would need some other ingredients in addition to the ones in the pantry, so I took a walk around the ship to see what I had in hand.

Of course, with the ship being in such bad shape and everything, it took me quite a long while to get what I'd wanted done, as I'd stop every now and then to talk to crewmen doing repairs all over the ship. Finally I stopped by Sickbay to ask the Doctor about some nutritional business. He was busy, as usual, but he seemed quite happy to see me.

As I was about to leave, I casually asked him as a passing remark, "By the way, Doctor, what do you know of paracetamol?" 

He glanced sharply up at me. "Paracetamol? It was a drug used by humans in the twentieth century as a relief for fever and headaches." 

"I thought so," I said, smiling. "The crew loves it." 

"The _crew_?" His eyes widened in horror. "_Don't_ tell me you've been dispensing it to them!" 

"Only as a temporary relief!" I blustered, suddenly realizing that it wasn't the wisest thing to do. "And the rubric said it was perfectly safe for humans!" 

"_Only_ in the correct doses!" exclaimed the Doctor, voice rising in exasperation. "Paracetamol has _adverse_ effects in large doses! Especially when taken with other stimulants such as caffeine- which, I believe, our esteemed crew consumes a lot of." He frowned at me. "How much did you give each crewmember?" 

"Well…" I was slightly hesitant. "I've only administered it to a few people so far... and approximately only about eight hundred milligrams per person." 

The Doctor looked shocked. "_Eight_ hundred?" He folded his arms. "Mr. Neelix, I suggest that in the future you consult me before issuing medicinal drugs to the crew!" 

"Eight hundred is too much?" I asked tentatively.

"Too much?" The Doctor waved his arms. "It's _twice_ the standard dosage for an adult human!" 

"Oh dear." I frowned. "What adverse effects does it have?" 

The Doctor shook his head, clearly not enjoying his pharmaceutical lecture. "An overdose of paracetamol can cause hallucinatory effects, as well as overloading the body's metabolic system-" 

"Wait, wait." Something suddenly struck me and left me cold. "Did you say something about caffeine?" 

"Yes, I did. I said that it amplifies the effect of the drug." 

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Uh-oh. Sam Wildman and the rest had been fine yesterday because I served their mix with _plain water._

But the captain…

The Doctor's commbadge trilled. He tapped it. "Sickbay." 

"Doctor?" It was Tom Paris' voice. I could hear noises in the background… music? He seemed slightly awkward. "I think you'd better come down to the Mess Hall, _fast_. There's a… medical emergency."

"On my way. EMH out." The Doctor gave me a sharp glare. "Care to tell me what all that was about?" 

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Double uh-oh. "The captain…" I began, but he got the hint before I could go further. Quickly snatching his mobile emitter from his desk in his office, he was out of the door faster than I could say "coffee." Feeling somewhat helpless, I hurried after him.

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Groovy groovy jazzy funky pounce bounce dance as we

Dip in the melodic sea; the rhythm keeps flowing and drips to the MC…

The Mess Hall was quite a sight. For one thing, hot jazz music was playing over the speaker system. For another, most of the off-duty crew were gathered there, watching in amazement. But for most part, it was the sight of Captain Janeway dancing on top of the long table with a somewhat unwilling Chakotay that was the cincher. She had taken off the upper jacket of her uniform and she was swinging to the infectious tune in her tank top, twirling her jacket above her head and trying to draw Chakotay closer to her.

When we stepped into the Mess Hall, Chakotay was frantically signaling to Tom Paris behind his blissfully oblivious captain's back. "Where's the doctor?" he mouthed frantically, as Captain Janeway started to lap-dance on him. He glanced up at us, and his worried face dissolved into relief. "Help," he said, pointing needlessly at the cavorting figure twisting herself around him.

The captain giggled. "Aren't you having fun, Chakotay?" 

He smiled to humor her. "Yes." 

She laughed and spun away from him. "Funky, funky," she sang with the music.

Chakotay glanced at the Doctor imploringly.

I gauged the reactions of the assembled crew, which ran the gamut from mortification to amusement. Even Seven had a slight smile on her face.

The Doctor quickly filled a hypospray with a suitable sedative and tossed it to Chakotay. With a soft hiss, Chakotay administered it to the captain's neck as she twirled in for another gyration session on Chakotay's lap. She collapsed into his arms with a soft sigh.

With as much grace as possible, Chakotay got off the table, carrying the captain's limp form in his arms. He cradled her gently on his lap as the Doctor ran his medical tricorder over her. "What in the world got into her?" he asked in concern.

"Too much paracetamol and caffeine, that's what," said the Doctor acidly, casting me a sharp glance. "What happened here?" 

Chakotay shrugged. "Well, we decided to play some old jazz from Earth's twentieth century to lighten up the mood here, and then…" He glanced up overhead as the rhythm continued. "First she complained she was hot, and took off her jacket, which was odd. Then she started to tap her feet, which was even odder. And… well, it wasn't long before she'd dragged me to join her up on that table." He frowned. "What's paracetamol, and why was she taking it anyway?" 

The Doctor shot me another accusatory look as he administered some counter-medication. "Well our friend here, Mr. Neelix, decided to appoint himself as ship's physician and start dispensing medication to the ship's crew." He gestured down to the captain. "And this is the result." 

I felt my spots flush and my whiskers stiffen in embarrassment. "Well, how was I supposed to know that would happen? There wasn't anything in the databank which-" I began.

The Doctor didn't let me finish. "I want to take her to Sickbay for further examination. To make sure the drug didn't have any other _adverse effects_." That last line was definitely meant for me.

Chakotay nodded wordlessly and stood, still carrying the captain, sleeping contentedly. He followed the Doctor out of the Mess Hall as Paris and Seven started to disperse the gathered crewmembers, many of whom were now tittering amongst themselves. I felt inexplicably guilty, so I followed Chakotay.

In the turbolift Chakotay was mostly silent, glancing down at the captain in concern. Finally he sighed. "I don't know how the crew is going to take to this," he said.

The Doctor looked worried. "I don't know how _she_ is going to take to this," he muttered. "Not just physically- mentally as well." 

Chakotay looked at the Doctor with uncertainty. "I don't know," he said softly. "I really don't know." 

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Smooth, my, floating like a butterfly; notes that I float, sung like a lullaby

Brace yourself as the beat hits ya; dip trip! Flip fantasia…

Three hours later she was still out cold. I'd gone to prepare dinner and had come back to the Mess Hall, and Chakotay was still working from Sickbay, waiting for her to wake. He didn't want her to be alone when she did. Part of me began to wonder if I'd done something terrible to her.

The news had spread like wildfire. Everywhere I turned it seemed that people were talking about nothing but the captain losing it in the Mess Hall. Dancing on the tables. It was depressing. I'd hoped that the crew would forget about it fast, but it seemed like there was no hope for that. Meanwhile I plagued Sickbay, trying to make everything as pleasant as it could be for her when she came to.

Finally she stirred on the biobed, moaning as the aftereffects of the drug overdose hit her. Chakotay was by her side instantly, holding her hand. "Kathryn." 

Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked disorientated and confused. "What just happened?" 

Chakotay patted her arm soothingly. "Everything's all right," he told her. "You had a drug overdose, but you're fine now." 

The memory seeped through to her sluggish brain and she sat up abruptly. "I remember! Oh gods-" 

Chakotay held her by her shoulders, trying to calm her down. "Relax, Kathryn! It was nothing… you should lie down and rest. You-" 

She pushed his hands away, frantic and shaking from the experience. "I was- oh goodness- I didn't know what I was doing-" She buried her head in her hands in mortification, trembling.

Chakotay drew his arm around her. "Kathryn," he said in a low voice. "Listen to me. Nobody blames you for what you did. You weren't yourself back there." 

She glanced up at him, eyes shining with tears of embarrassment. "What will the crew think?" she whispered.

I felt awful. This was my entire fault. "Captain," I began, "I'm sorry. I was careless in giving you that drug. I accept full responsibility for everything." 

She glanced up at me, part of that steel returning into her eyes. "No, Mr. Neelix, you shouldn't take the blame for whatever I did when I lost all my inhibitions. It wasn't by any of your design." Her cheeks were flushed pink now, and she rubbed her temple. "Chakotay, what time is it?" 

"Captain, you're due on the bridge in ten minutes, but…" he gestured in exasperation. "You're not going for duty in this state!" 

"Precisely." The Doctor brushed past me- not impolitely, but with just enough force to imply that I was getting in the way. "You need at least a day's rest." He sighed. "Moral of the story is, don't allow replicators to dispense such substances to anyone who wishes to consume them. My oversight." 

I wanted to moan. Why was everyone else blaming himself or herself for my gaffe? Morale officer of the ship, I thought, and I'm getting everyone to wallow in self-accusation.

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Morale officer of the ship. Surely I could do something to help her?

Then it clicked. Of course. It wasn't just a problem confined to a few select people; it was a ship-wide syndrome, an affair which everybody played a part in. And who better to rectify it than me? I left Sickbay, secure in knowing what course of action I should pursue. 


	2. Chapter 2

onneelix2 ****

And The Morale Of The Story Is…

An excerpt from _Memoirs of the Delta Quadrant_ by Neelix

Edited by Lt. Taya 17 Janeway (TaTTooGaL™)

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Jump to the jam boogy woogy jam slam

Bust the dialect; I'm the man in command

Come flow to the beat of the mighty mic master

Rhyming on the mic I'll bring the suckers to disaster…

Sam Wildman was tired as she returned to her quarters. It had been a long, hard day at work, rewiring damaged circuit junctions and doing major repair work on the ship's infrastructure. Tension had been high at work- they badly needed new parts for the ship, but they had just left very unfriendly space and might not be able to find a trading partner for quite a while more. And in the midst of all the bad news had come dubious rumors about the captain breaking into a wild dancing spree in the Mess Hall. Sam sighed as she glanced over at Naomi, sound asleep in the adjoining section of her quarters. _What kind of insane environment am I raising my daughter in?_ She wondered. _Borg as playmates, alien attacks every other week, and goodness knows what other weird things. _She constantly worried about Naomi not being able to integrate with other people her age when they got back to Earth. _She leads such a strange and lonely life here._

Sam went over to her desk and keyed in a few commands, hoping she didn't have too much work to do that night. With her crazy schedule she had barely been able to squeeze in a few minutes with her daughter each day, and it was driving her nuts. In a weird way she missed the security and peace of Earth, which was why she was working her butt off to help get this ship back to the Alpha Quadrant. Back to where her husband and her family were.

A message flashed on the screen. Someone had posted a file on her desktop- I'd just sent it to most of the crew. Mystified, she opened it. It was a letter. She read the first few lines and groaned. So the unbelievable rumors about the captain had been true after all. But she read on anyway, curious as to what I was up to.

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Dear Members of the Crew, I began,

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You have probably heard about the Mess Hall incident today by now. For those of you who don't believe it, yes, it's true. And whatever you may think of it, I must first and foremost tell you that I take full responsibility for what happened. It was none of the captain's fault, and she wasn't acting of her own accord. So please, I beseech all of you, forget about it.

You are probably wondering why I am writing this letter to all of you. Well, I need your help. Of late I have noticed that things aren't going too well on this ship. People become depressed easily, and spirits are generally low. The captain especially seems to have slipped into a mood of a general despondency. And as morale officer on this ship I feel that it is my duty to change this.

The Voyager_ is a small ship, and as we all know, things are hard to conceal from each other. Secrets are hard to keep, and any form of conflict quickly boils over into something drastic. Not very nice. To make this ship a better place for all of us, something must be done. And it begins with all of us._

Everyday we can make a difference to the lives of those all around us. Just a smile, a simple "Good morning," or "How's your day going?" can do wonders to lift a person's spirit. Now, I'm not saying that we're a bunch of indifferent, dispassionate people. We just need to show that we care more often.

Our captain especially. I know that she has put so much extra effort into reaching out to each and everyone of us, to make sure that none of us are feeling lost and alone, to make sure that everything is going right on this ship. But how many of us have actually reciprocated this? How many of us go out of our way to make sure that she is alright, ask her about how her day is going, or take some time to encourage her when it seems like all hope is lost? There is so much stress involved in captaining a ship, any ship, and especially one that is by itself in this unfeeling wilderness. She tries to hard to be a role model for all of us it sometimes breaks my heart to see her struggling to battle her inner demons to keep a brave face. And it is inevitable that that wall of steel is going to have to come down sometime if we don't do anything about it.

I know that this request may seem slightly outrageous to you, but what I am asking is that we all be nicer to our captain. And I don't just mean smiling at her when we see her in the corridor, or asking her the occasional question about how her life is going. I speak of something bigger, more significant. I hope that we can all accept her as she is. Learn to accept her shortcomings and forgive her for her mistakes. To stop seeing her in terms of what Starfleet wants of her, or what we want of her, or even what she wants of herself. To stop continually judging her. To treat her as a friend, just a fellow traveler with a common destination. We are all part of the same ship, in the same boat. She shares our hopes, joys, aspirations and setbacks. She is only human. And she is one of us.

I hope that this message will not go unnoticed by you all. We need to make this ship a better place to live in. And the best thing is, you can start today…

At this point Sam realized that her eyes were growing moist, touched by the earnest passion conveyed in the simple words I had written. Okay, so it _did_ sound slightly cheesy, but it struck a chord within her. "Neelix, you're a genius," she muttered. This was just what she needed- a ray of light to help her get rid of the perpetual tired depression she seemed to be in right now. Sometimes the stresses of living on this ship eclipsed the fact that your neighbor too suffered the same, from the lowest crewman belowdecks all the way to the captain. It made her feel better just thinking that if she was miserable, then there were lots of others on this ship who were miserable as well. Communal dejection. The sudden wash of empathy over her almost made her smile. Imagine! Such a kinship she shared with those around her. "Neelix, when we get back to the Alpha Quadrant we should make you some sort of ambassador. You have it in you to stop wars," she said to herself.

She read on, then her jaw dropped slightly. "Then again, I take that back," she said as she reached the ending "Signed, Neelix". "You may be caring and compassionate, but you're also a complete nutcase." 

Naomi had woken in the meantime, and she padded over to her mother. "What's this all about?" 

Sam chuckled. "Just some hare-brained idea which Neelix came up with," she replied. _Great. My daughter has a lunatic for a godfather._ Gathering Naomi into her arms, she picked up a stylus, settled down with her daughter, and began to write.

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Many tripped the tour upon the rhyme they saw 

To an infinite height to the realm of the hard-core

Here we go, off I take ya; dip trip! Flip fantasia…

Janeway felt like she had reached the end of her endurance. She was tired, her head was throbbing, and her ship was still in disarray. To top it all she had mortally embarrassed herself in front of her crew. The Doctor had assured her that one side effect of the drug overdose would be an overwhelming sense of depression after, but she wasn't entirely sure that what she was feeling now was all drug-induced.

She leaned on her couch and sighed, closing her eyes. Her head still hurt mildly, despite the Doctor's efforts. Or was it all her imagination? It felt awful.

Her desktop computer terminal beeped, and she felt a small twinge of irritation. _What could that be?_ She wondered. Groaning, she dragged herself off the couch and headed to her computer terminal. A surprise: it was a letter, addressed to her. She opened it: it was from Samantha Wildman.

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Dear _Captain_, it began, 

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I know it must seem strange to you for me to write this letter, but I felt that it was only the right thing to do. Wouldn't it be stranger if I'd lived on the same small ship with somebody else for more than six years and never got to know her better than I should? Yet I've never talked with you for more than five minutes at a time, never shared anything private with you, or expressed my innermost feelings. I've never even written a letter to you. So maybe this would be a good time to start.

I could say so many things in this letter. I could tell you how thankful I am to have you as my captain, or what a wonderful job you are doing in running this ship, or even how grateful I am to you that I have my wonderful daughter with me today. But I won't. I don't want this to be just another appreciation letter to a superior. (You must get tons of these everyday!) I want to address you as a friend would. We- all of us on this ship, that is- have gone through so much together, it would be unnatural if we can't address each other with less than formality. I hope you don't mind.

To tell the truth, I've wanted to do something like this for a very long time, but I've never gotten enough motivation to do so. (Call me lazy…) I guess it was the message that Neelix sent out to us that catalyzed the start of this letter. He probably sent it because he was feeling guilty about the Mess Hall incident (as we've all begun to euphemistically refer to it by) but it did strike a raw nerve. I started to realize how much I'd alienated myself from other members of the crew, except for a few close friends. And I know many other crewmen are guilty of it too. Especially on the lower decks- here we all know each other very intimately, but we hardly ever get to interact with the senior crew on a non-formal basis. Not as much as we'd like, anyway.

But I want to change that. I want to be able to look back on my days on Voyager when I'm eighty years old (and I'm dead sure we'll get back to Earth before that) and remember them as warm and friendly. Sure, we'll have a rough spot here and there, inevitable in space, but at least there'll always be friends on this ship. 

So I'd like to begin by inviting you to dinner at my quarters with my daughter, any time you're free. I have so many things I'd like to talk about with you. (Am I allowed to use emoticons in this letter? Just kidding. J (Hahaha) Geez.) I won't be offended if you refuse and reassign me to scrubbing the decks for having the cheek to ask, but I hope not. J And I just couldn't resist the smiley.

Well, I guess I've said most of what I've wanted to say for this letter. I hope you're coming to Neelix's crazy pink party tomorrow night, if you're feeling well enough. It sounds totally insane, but promises to be fun.

And, oh… one more question… when we're off duty, may I call you Kathryn?

Take care, okay?

Sincerely,

Samantha Wildman

She took a deep breath, trembling with emotion. It'd been a long, long time since anyone had sent her a letter like this. It brought back so many memories, of Mark, even her old academy friend Will Riker. As far as she could remember, no-one on this ship had ever written something like this, as if speaking to a friend instead of a superior officer. And oddly she didn't feel offended as some might have been in her place. Instead she found the letter comforting, uplifting even. She wanted to write back to Sam immediately, thank her for her concern, for making her day, anything! And did she want to have dinner with her? When was the last time she had dinner with someone other than one of her senior crew? Of course she did! She picked up her stylus, headache and depression forgotten, ready to pen a return letter, when her terminal beeped again.

Another letter! This time from Ayala in Security… and another, and another, and another! Some of them were just thank-you notes, others were long essays full of flashbacks; some were written by a shift a deck, a section: even a long, emotionally-charged message from the Equinox crew- well, she'd almost stop thinking of them as that, they were her crew now- ; there were letters from all echelons of the ship, from the common crewman all the way to Commander Chakotay, who wrote the longest letter of all, second only to B'Elanna (who'd apparently written it while on duty- but not that Starfleet condones slacking on the job, mind you!).

Janeway shook her head and muttered to herself, laughing. "Neelix, you contriving little devil. Did you plan all this? Or was this overwhelming response totally unpredicted?" But whatever it was, she was fairly sure that her crew's words were sincere. And the honest words, written with spontaneity and feeling, touched her deeply. This was what she'd been working for for six long years, to keep her crew together, keep their spirits up. And now they were repaying the favor. She vowed to keep those words close to her heart, to act as a beacon of hope when things were down.

She sifted through the messages again, and noticed that one thing kept popping up: the pink party to be held the next day. In writing my letter to the crew, I'd neglected to tell her about this outrageous idea of mine. Well, she didn't mind, of course. She even agreed to hold something similar to it every month after the event.

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Yes yes yes on and on as I flex, [something] words manifest

Feel the vibe from here to Asia; dip trip! Flip fantasia!

The party itself was a complete blast (that's a common Terran expression, right?). Everybody turned up, even those on duty who took turns to crash the party -in shifts, of course. It wasn't exactly the wisest idea to let our guard down like that, but the crew just needed to find some way to rest and relax after the tensions of the past few days.

So Tom and I worked hard over this new holoprogram to hold the party in. It was a large room, basically, with a sufficiently stocked bar, and plenty of floor space for all the crew members. We did it up in a snazzy style of décor, complete with jewel lights and sequinned drapes. And for that night only we arranged long rows of tables across the room, just for the occasion.

The first few people to trickle in looked slightly nervous and unsure of themselves. Many of them had chosen to wear their uniforms, but a few adventurous ones had worn civvies over, which was good. As more people started to come, the crew began to relax a bit. 

The first senior crew members to arrive were Tom and Harry, both of whom had whimsically decided to dress in their Captain Proton suits for the evening. B'Elanna arrived directly after her shift with Tuvok, then followed by Seven and the Doctor, and finally Chakotay and the captain. None of them were in uniform- even Seven had dressed up, probably with the Doctor's help. The captain herself was wearing a stunning flared blue gown, tastefully low-cut.

I served light snacks to the crew as they mingled and celebrated their friendships. But everyone was waiting for the highlight of the day. 

The first cue came when strains of hot jazz began playing over Tom's carefully calibrated speaker system. The crew tittered in anticipation as Chakotay took the first step onto the nearest table. He held out his hand to the captain. "May I have this dance?" 

She laughed, took his hand and ascended on the table. "I'd be delighted." 

One by one, some shyly, some laughing at the sheer insanity of it, the crew of the _Voyager_ mounted the rows of tables we'd set up. And when the signal was given, we started to dance. All-out, the whole night, all the crew on the tables, having the time of their lives. Swapping partners, grooving, and totally enjoying themselves.

And after that series of events the crew grew much closer to the captain as well as each other, of course. You don't do things like that everyday and not get affected by them. Even so many years after we've returned to the Alpha Quadrant, we still talk about it: in our correspondences, at our annual reunion. "Remember the time we all got up on tables and danced?…" 

And would you believe it all started with eight hundred milligrams of paracetamol? Life does strange wonders sometimes.

__________**The** **End**_________

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Questions, comments or reviews? Please! [auburnone@subspacemail.com][1]

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